Last Kicks on Route 66

Mr D'z Route 66 Diner.  And a shadow.

Today was a long day.  From Amarillo all the way to Kingman, AZ.  We gained two time zones by crossing two state lines on the way back (because AZ is MST instead of MDT - it aligns with PDT).  So we had two time jumps today.  They made a long day feel much shorter.  I think we drove for 12 hours, but it felt like much less - we arrived at around 5:30, but for us it's still 7:30.  I think the two-day drive from MO is doable, but painful.  If we had two full days, we could pull it off.  If we tried it today, we have ended up back in San Jose at 1AM.  We decided that was not the best idea, and we stopped.


We took some time to visit an old Route 66 diner.  It was fun.  Our first trip through Kingman on the way out was short, and we didn't see much.  I found it rather underwhelming.  But this second look through the town showed us that there was a lot more to this place than we originally thought.  A lot more history, and a lot more beauty.  I'm a little sad I can't spend a little longer here.

The girl I love in Mr. D'z Route 66 Diner - Kingman, AZ

I'm going to do my pensive thing now, as Allyssa calls it.  Sorry in advance.

I keep wondering if it's still possible to drive old Route 66.  I looked it up.  No.  Not anymore.  You can drive about 85% of the original route.  The rest has fallen into disrepair, is closed, and inaccessible.  When you drive out to Missouri from CA, if you're on 40 - you're on the remnants of 66 for a significant portion of the way.  In some places,  the freeway parallels the old road (it's more obvious as you drive through New Mexico) and in others, the freeway is old 66.

I was watching that old road today as we made the drive home, thinking about all of the cars that used to drive along that way.  All the people who made their journey west (and east) on that old narrow highway.  This is the road that my grandpa (who we lovingly call Pa) drove when taking his family out to California almost half a century ago.  I wonder what he'd think if
he could see it now and drive it again.

In its heyday, 66 was the lifeblood of many small towns.  The dawning of the interstate era killed many of them.  All along the way, I kept seeing old abandoned buildings.  And I keep thinking - Some person built that.  Did they ever think that this was the future of that building?  Did they ever imagine it as a ruin along a dead, grass-covered highway?  Sometimes I see an old house missing part of a roof, and I think... I wonder who lived there.  Did some children once call that place home?  Did dad build it with his own two hands?  When did they leave it behind, and why did they go?  

You can see the original Route 66 in this photo, just north of the freeway.

These kinds of questions haunt me more when I visit the midwest.  In San Jose, the question isn't asked nearly as often.  Houses rarely fall into that kind of disrepair.  Our real-estate turns over so fast that a house not selling within a week is practically unthinkable.  But that's not the case out east.  Things don't always sell.  And sometimes, they just die - and the world goes on.  Everything changes.

And I guess that's been kind of a theme on this trip.  Everything changes.  Nothing stays the same.  The more I try to hold on to the past, the more it slips through my fingers - like it was never there to begin with.  All I can do is hold on to the present that I have.  The world will never be like this again.  Remember today - hold it close, and breathe it in deep.  Tomorrow, it will be gone.

I should just go read Ecclesiastes.